Elgin Police Switching To Safer Guns

Seeking more safety and less liability, the Elgin Police Department is switching from its standard Colt .45 semiautomatic handgun to a Smith & Wesson model gaining favor across the nation.

The City Council has approved spending more than $67,000 to buy 134 of the Smith & Wesson 4586 and 4556 semiautomatic pistols. The guns should be in the hands of officers on the street by the middle of September, said Daniel McCollum, the department`s director of training.

The main difference between the new gun and the Colt 1911 is in the firing action, McCollum said.

The Colt is a single-action weapon, meaning it is cocked and a pull of the trigger brings the hammer down and fires the bullet. The Smith & Wesson is double-action, meaning it must be cocked first to fire, which requires a longer stroke of the trigger and more force to discharge.

The bottom line of that difference, officials said, is that an accidental discharge is much less likely with the new weapon. /

``When our officers shoot, I want them to intend to shoot,`` said Police Chief Charles Gruber. ``The new gun will cut down on the potential for accidental firing.``

That reasoning has been used by police chiefs in other cities, such as New York, Miami and Philadelphia, all of whom have ordered their patrol forces to carry double-action weapons. In the Chicago area, the Du Page County sheriff`s police, as well as officers in Homewood and Glen Ellyn, also carry double-action guns.

The philosophy behind the move is based greatly on the fact that in daily police work the main job of the service weapon is not gunfighting but threat management.

``An officer`s gun may be drawn in a career many times, but it may never be used,`` Gruber said.

The potential problem with the single-action weapon is that in times of stress for an officer the gun`s light trigger can become, in a way, even lighter, officials said.

In these stressful periods, people can experience muscle tremors and a slight loss of motor coordination. And as a person`s adrenalin flows, he or she may gain physical strength, making a pull on the trigger that much easier, officials said.

A study done by McCollum showed that in the last 10 years Elgin officers have recorded seven accidental discharges, one of which left an officer wounded. Although that number is low, Gruber and McCollum said they hope the introduction of the double-action gun cuts down accidents even more. At the same time, police across the United States are trying to protect themselves from liability in cases where an officer shoots someone accidentally. Courts have ruled that arming an officer with a cocked and locked weapon can be considered negligent in the event of an accidental shooting.

Elgin police and others elsewhere see the introduction of the double-action gun as a measure of protection in those cases.

The decision to switch from the Colt, which the department used for 20 years, came despite an internal survey of Elgin officers in which more than 65 percent of the 107 who responded said they did not want to change. It was made on the recommendation of McCollum, who spent about three months researching the issue.

The change comes at a time when many police departments are buying guns with more firepower to face a new breed of criminals often armed with high-tech automatic and semiautomatic guns.

Gruber and McCollum said, however, that firepower was not the issue here. The Smith & Wesson has almost the identical stopping power of the Colt, a product more of the ammunition than the gun, McCollum said. The Smith & Wesson carries only one more round than the Colt,eight rounds in the magazine and one in the chamber.

``Firepower was a minor issue,`` Gruber said. ``Safety was the main concern.``

McCollum said a few Elgin officers will be trained in the new weapons by Smith & Wesson instructors. They, in turn, will teach their comrades how to use the guns.

Elgin officers will have a choice between the 4586 and the 4556, a smaller version of the same gun, McCollum said. It will be the first time that Elgin will supply guns to its officers, who in the past bought their own weapons and kept them as personal property.